Multics

Inessential L
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(Revision 4.26)
http://stuff.mit.edu/sipb/ilatex
The Student Information Processing Board
May 17, 2007

Copyright c 19872007 Student Information Processing Board of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Inessential L
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Contents
1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 What is L
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X ? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 L
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X on Athena . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2 Getting Started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
3 Creating your Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1 In the Beginning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.2 Title Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3.3 Body . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.4 Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
3.5 Ending the Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4 Processing your Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.1 Running L
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X . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.2 Previewing the Final Output . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.3 Printing the File . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.4 Producing PDFs and Web Pages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
4.4.1 pdatex limitations and specics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
4.4.2 Web documents from LaTeX source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
4.5 Landscape (or Sideways) Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
4.6 Using Both Sides of the Paper: Duplex and Tumble Modes . . . . . . . . . . 10
5 Error Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
5.1 L
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5.2 T
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5.3 Warnings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
6 Other useful things to know about . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
6.1 Margins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
6.2 Type Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
6.3 Type Sizes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6.4 Footnotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6.5 Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
6.6 Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
7 Documents in Foreign Languages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
8 Mathematical Text and other Special Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
9 Pretty Pictures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
9.1 Including PostScript and PDF Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
9.2 L
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10 Citations and References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
11 Setting Page Layout Parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
12 Where to Get More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
13 Converting from L
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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
14 Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
15 List of Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
16 List of Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
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1 Introduction
1.1 What is L
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X ?
L
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X is a complex text-processing system often recommended by the SIPB and used for scholarly
publishing all over academia, and by many of your professors.
There are L
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X manuals available for use in the SIPB oce, and youre welcome to drop by the
oce with a question. There are also manuals available for short-time loan from the OLC (On-Line
Consultants) oce (N42) and some available for withdrawal from the MIT Libraries. There is also
plenty of documentation online (see Section 12 on p. 27).
If you have any comments, additions or corrections to this manual, please send them to
sipb@mit.edu or drop by the SIPB oce (W20-557) and let us know.
L
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X works by processing a text source le containing formatting commands, and produces
high-quality output. This source le is created by you, using a text editor. This separation between
editing and processing is a major dierence between L
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X and word processors like Microsoft Word
or OpenOce, as well desktop publishing software like Adobe InDesign or Quark XPress, all of
which are WYSIWYG
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tools.
A major advantage to L
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Xs non-WYSIWYG interface is the ability to manage your document
as raw text under a revision control system such as RCS or CVS, as well as the ability to exercise
precise control over the output in ways that WYSIWYG systems often do not allow. It is also
much easier to produce complex equations.
1.2 L
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X on Athena
You can run L
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X on any Athena workstation. Instructions for setting up your environment and
running L
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X on these platforms are given in Section 4 (p. 8) of this document. To get more
information on using other software available on the Athena workstations, see the Getting Started
on Athena document available from MIT Copy Tech, and the Inessential Guide to Athena available
from the SIPB oce (W20-557).
Versions of L
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X can be obtained many other types of machines. However, many L
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X dis-
tributions for popular platforms are commercial packages, and their features and usage may dier.
Hopefully, your L
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X package will come with some instructions for setting it up and running it.
The version of L
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X described in this document is version L
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X2

, which is the version

currently supported by Athena and SIPB. Version 2.09 is still available in the newtex locker under
the name latex209. Section 11 of this document describes the dierences between the two versions.
2 Getting Started
This section describes how to typeset a simple paper in the standard way for processing by L
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X.
All of the information here is also presented elsewhere in this document, but with a lot more detail;
think of this section as the short form to using L
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X.
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What You See Is What You Get
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The rst thing you need to do is to create your L
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X source le. This le contains all the text
for your paper as well as L
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X commands (to be described shortly). You can use any editor you
wish to create the le; documentation on how to use text editors is available from Athena. Emacs
includes special code set up to make using L
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X easier, and is a good rst choice. You can name
your L
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X le anything you wish; the only requirement is that it end with the four characters .tex.
The general format of a L
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X le is shown in the following example.
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[doublespacing]{setspace}
\usepackage{fullpage}
\title{A Sample Paper}
\author{Melissa I. Thompson}
\date{June 16, 1904}
\begin{document}
\maketitle
It was a dark and stormy night, and all of the Athena fileservers had
crashed. Poor me, I had to write a paper for one of my HASS-D
classes.
Luckily, I was able to use a wonderful text formatting program called
\LaTeX{}, and everything worked out fine.
\end{document}
Here is a description of each part.
The rst line of every L
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X le contains a \documentclass command. This command tells
L
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X the general style of your document as well as the style options you wish to use.
The word in between {curly braces} is the main style. You can specify options for the style
in square brackets before the main style. For example, \documentclass[12pt]{article}
would use article document class in 12 point type.
The \usepackage commands species additional packages or to use. For example, the
doublespace package tells L
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X to doublespace your document, and the fullpage option
says to set the margins so you have one inch of blank space on all sides. You can supply options
to these packages in square brackets as well: \usepackage[doublespacing]{setspace}
The \title, \author, and \date commands are used to specify the title, author and creation
date of the document. The default date is \today (meaning that you dont need to give the
\date command if you just want to use the current date).
The \begin{document} line marks the beginning of the main part of the document. The
section before this line is called the preamble. More on this later.
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The \maketitle line tells L
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X to insert a title page in the beginning of your document.
The data from each of the \title, author, and \date commands is used here.
\LaTeX{} is a special command in L
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X, used to represent the appropriate magic so that
you see L
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X instead of LaTeX.
The \end{document} line marks the end of the main part of the document. In L
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X, some-
thing between \begin{foo} and \end{foo} is said to be in the foo environment (more on
environments later).
3 Creating your Document
For L
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X to know that you are writing a document, you have to give it some information rst.
This section describes what you need to have in a le to run it through L
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X.
3.1 In the Beginning. . .
A typical le, such as a term paper, will begin like this:
\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
This tells L
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X the following things:
This example is an article. The article style may be used for any kind of standard paper.
An article is shorter than a report.
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The book style also exists. It is meant for real books.
These options control section headings and tables of contents and other things.
The main text is printed in a 10 point font by default. There are several text sizes available:
10, 11, and 12 point. This document is printed in 11 point. The various type sizes within a
document are relative to this base size, as described in subsection 6.3 (p. 14). If no base size
is specied, 10 point is assumed. To change to a base size of 11 point or 12 point, change the
document class with an optional parameter, placed inside square braces immediately after
the command name, like this:
\documentclass[11pt]{article}
There are many other optional parameters which can be used, some of which will be mentioned
later. They are all entered inside the square brackets and are separated by commas, with no
spaces in between. For example,
\documentclass[twoside,11pt]{report}
\usepackage[doublespacing]{setspace}
sets the document up as an 11-point, double-spaced, double-sided report.
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This L
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The space between the \documentclass and the \begin{document} commands is called the
header area or preamble. Various control parameters, such as the layout of the title page (if
you want one) go here. The actual text of your document begins after the \begin{document}.
There are many packages and options which may be included with the \usepackage line or
as an option to \documentclass. Packages can also take options, which are specied in square
brackets before the package name. You can include multiple packages with a single \usepackage
command. For example, \usepackage[red,blue]{foo,bar} would include the packages foo and
bar, giving the red and blue options to both. Some of the common packages are:
setspace Allows for doublespaceing; denes \doublespacing, \singlespacing, and
\onehalfspacing for changing document spacing. Also allows them as options.
fullpage Sets up 1 inch margins.
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geometry Enables commands to simplify modifying the margins. This gives more exibility than
th fullpage package.
graphicx Allows you to include PostScript graphics. See Section 9.1 (p. 25 or texdoc grfguide).
latexsym Denes several symbols not dened by default in L
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. See Figure 5 (p. 19) for a

list of these symbols, or texdoc symbols.
quiet Will tell L
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X to run in quiet mode, suppressing warning messages.
mathptmx To format the entire document (with math) in Times Roman font.
times To format the non-math portions of the document in Times Roman font.
palatino To format the non-math portions of the document in Palatino font.
helvet To format the non-math portions of the document in Helvetica font.
ncs To format the non-math portions of the document in New Century Schoolbook font.
avantgarde To format the non-math portions of the document in Avant-Garde font.
bookman To format the non-math portions of the document in Bookman font.
For detailed documentation on most packages, try texdoc packagename . For an overview of
most installed packages, see texdoc index.html. For details on the fonts, texdoc psnfss2e.
Some standard options for L
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Xs documentclasses:
twocolumn Will print text in two vertical columns, side by side.
3.2 Title Page
To put a title page into a document, you could type the following:
\documentclass{report}
\title{Inessential \LaTeX{}}
\author{The Student Information Processing Board}
\date{January 1, 1969} % If you use \today, the date may change inadvertently.
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Both fullpage and simplemargins (see below) are explained in detail in Section 6.1, p. 13.
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\begin{document}
\maketitle
Creating a title page is a two step process in L
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X. First you give it the information you want
it to put on the title page and then you tell it to make the title page. The \title, \author
and \date commands do not generate textthey merely specify what \maketitle will place on
the title page. If you use \maketitle, you must specify a \title, but any or all of the others
may be omitted. The \maketitle command generates the title page. You must place it after the
\begin{document}. In the article document style, the title block is at the top of the rst page
of the document. To put the title block on a page by itself place a \newpage command after the
\maketitle. In the report and book styles, it is on a separate page at the beginning.
L
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X will automatically number pages, but often you dont want a page number on the title
page. To eliminate the page number on the rst page, put \thispagestyle{empty} before the
\maketitle.
It is possible to number pages alphabetically or with Roman numerals. It is also possible to
change the current page number. See the section of the L
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X manual on page styles.
You can also generate a title page using the titlepage environment. Anything placed in this
environment will be placed on the title page (which will be a separate page even if you are using
the article document class). Another good way to create a title page is to do it yourself, probably
using commands like \begin{center}, \large{}, and \newpage. Using this method, L
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X wont
know the dierence between your title page and any other page, but it may be easier to get what
you want.
3.3 Body
The body of the document can be normal text. Paragraphs are separated by completely blank lines
or by the \par command.
Special characters When entering normal text, you must watch out for a few things. Some
characters are reserved for commands to L
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X, and are treated as such unless you tell L
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X to
treat them as normal characters. To use the characters
# $ % & _ { }
outside of a verbatim environment (see Section 6 for more information on environments, p. 13),
you must precede them with a backslash (\), like this:
\# \$ \% \& \_ \{ \}
These characters are also reserved:
~ ^ \ < >
Often, if you think you want one of these characters, you probably want to do something else.
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~ can be produced in several ways. If you want a tilde over a character, like n, you can type
\~{n} or \~n. If you want a mathematical you can type $\sim$ (which stands for similar
to). More often you will want the within another math expression anyhow; for more detail
see Section 8, p. 17.
^ can likewise mean circumex, as in o which is produced with \^{o} or \^o. In math mode
you would use \hat{o} to indicate a unit vector.
\ is not used very often in normal writing, but you can type $\backslash$ if you want to
use it.
< and > can be written as $<$ and $>$. If you insert these symbols in your document without
quoting them as described here, they will appear as upside-down exclamation points () and
question marks ().
Quotation Marks Ever notice how typeset material always has nice quotation marks, for exam-
ple, this instead of this? L
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X can generate these fancy quotes with just a little eort on your
part. The character, used to start a quotation, is made by typing . Note that these are reverse
quote, or back-tick characters, usually found on the upper-left hand side of PC-style keyboards
(however, Sun keyboards puts it in the upper right). The character is made by typing . In
Emacs, the default mode for L
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X les (called tex-mode) will generate the proper characters when
you press the " key. Emacss latex-mode is automatically loaded when you load a le ending in
.tex that has a \documentclass command near the top.
Divisions Text can be divided into parts, chapters,
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sections, subsections, subsubsections, para-
graphs, and subparagraphs. Each division has its own L
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X command (\section, \subsection,
etc.). These commands produce the appropriate headings and entries in the table of contents, as
well as numbering the divisions. For normal use, you probably want to use section, subsection,
and paragraph. The section paragraph is dierent from the command \par. A section command
places the title you give it in bold at the beginning of the paragraph. The \par command simply
marks the beginning of the paragraph, as would a blank line.
For example, in this document you are currently reading:
\section{Creating Your Document}
... things that are in the section ...
\subsection{Body}
... things that are in the subsection ...
\paragraph{Divisions}
... things that are in the paragraph ...
If you dont want the division to be numbered in the document, include an asterisk (*) after
the division name (e.g. \subsection*{Body}).
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Chapters are available within book and report but not in article, so that an article can be included as a chapter.
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Table of Contents Since L
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document, it can easily collect it and build a table of contents. It will only do this if you explicitly
tell it to. L
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X will put the table of contents wherever you include the line: \tableofcontents
To put the table of contents at the beginning (where people expect to nd it) just put it in
after the \maketitle command. You should run L
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X at least twice after you add the table of
contents, since it takes two or three tries to get the table of contents rightonce to write all the
page numbers out to a le
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, and a second time to include those numbers at the beginning of the
document, and possibly a third time if the number of pages the table of contents occupies changes.
When you make major changes, L
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X may tell you that you need to run it twice. It is always a
good idea to do this before you print the nal version of a document, just to make sure everything
is correct.
3.4 Environments
You can change how L
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X treats a certain section of text (for instance changing the type style). In
L
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X lingo, you need to indicate the scope of the command you are using to change the environment.
For small sections of text, this is done by starting the environment with a left curly brace {
character, followed by the command to change the defaults, and ending with the right curly brace }
character.
For example, to make appear in a larger font, you could type {\Large larger font}. This
limits the scope of the large command to the environment within the braces.
An environment can also be delimited with a beginend pair. This is quite useful for larger
sections of text. For example, to center multiple lines of text (here on the left), you could use the
commands on the right:
like
these two,
\begin{center}
like\\
these two,
\end{center}
The \\ at the end of the second line tells L
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X to break the line at that point, rather than lling
the text completely between the two margins like it normally does. It allows you to force lines to
end when you want them to, rather than when L
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X wants them to.
3.5 Ending the Document
The last thing to put in the document is the line: \end{document}
L
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X ignores anything which follows the \end{document} command. The only text after this
should be comments, since you have now nished your document.
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This information is stored in the le ending in .aux, which some people remove between invocations of L
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X.
This causes L
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X to have to repeat a lot of work, so you should avoid doing this until youre sure that you wont be
re-running L
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X again in the near future.
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4 Processing your Document
Once you have written your le and entered all the necessary L
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X commands, you have to process
the le before previewing or printing it.
A graphical frontend to L
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X named LyX is also available in the lyx locker.
4.1 Running L
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X
You can process a L
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X le by typing: latex filename.tex where filename.tex is the name of
your le that you want to process. L
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X produces an output le named filename.dvi (a device
independent le), which can be converted and printed on various types of printers.
4.2 Previewing the Final Output
It is usually convenient to preview your document before printing it. Running xdvi filename &
creates a window which shows you what the le will look like when it is printed on the printer.
After you position the xdvi window on your screen, it should show the rst page of the document.
You can use this like the more command: hit space to go forward a page, and b to go back a page.
This way you can go back and forth between the xdvi previewer and the L
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X source, rerunning
L
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X and looking at the xdvi display each time (xdvi automatically notices that youve changed
something, and displays the newest output).
4.3 Printing the File
When you are ready to print out the le, you must convert from dvi format to the format of the
printer you are using. To translate filename.dvi to PostScript
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and send it to your default printer,
use the command: dvips filename.dvi
If you have no default printer
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or you want to send the printout to a specic printer use the
command: dvips -Pprintername filename.dvi
replacing printername with the name of the printer to which you want to send your document.
It is possible to obtain the intermediate PostScript le with the command:
dvips -o filename.ps filename.dvi
It is possible to select particular pages out of a document, if you are making changes and want
to see what they will look like on paper (note that xdvi gives a very accurate rendition, and should
be enough for most purposes). The command:
dvips -pfirst -llast -Pprintername filename.dvi
will print from the page numbered rst to the page numbered last.
For more information on dvips, type man dvips (for the manual page, brief), or texdoc dvips
(for the full documentation). The older dvi2ps program no longer exists on Athena.
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PostScript is the language understood by Athena printers, and many others.
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You can check this by typing lpq and noting what printer it lists.
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4.4 Producing PDFs and Web Pages
The Adobe Portable Document Format is now the lingua franca of much of the world; L
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X has
several way to produce PDF documents (whichever you choose, be sure to inspect the PDF le to
make sure it came out ok):
1. Typing pdflatex filename.tex will run a special version of the L
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X interpreter that
handles PDF les and produce filename.pdf. It the easiest choice, but it has some limitations
with respect to included images; see below.
2. If the other methods gets a symbol wrong (as may happen), try the longer approach of
creating a PostScript le and producing the PDF from that. Create the PostScript le with
dvips -P pdf -G/0 file.dvi. On Sun machines, you can create the PDF with Adobes
commercial software with add acro; distill file.ps; on other machines, you must use
the free software equivalent, add gnu; ps2pdf file.ps.
3. The dvipdfm utility will produce a PDF le from a DVI le. First latex filename.tex to
produce the DVI le, and then dvipdfm filename.dvi to produce the PDF.
See texdoc dvipdfm for the full documentation
8
; it cannot include most PostScript images
without special care.
4.4.1 pdatex limitations and specics
See texdoc pdftex for a full explanation of pdflatex. The most striking limitation is that
pdflatex cannot import PostScript images instead, you need an image in PDF, PNG, JPEG, or
TIFF format.
To put gures in your document, you can make them available to pdflatex as their own PDFs,
using epstopdf (see Section 9.1, p. 25).
To encode hypertext references in your PDF, you can use the hyperref package and use
\href{URL }{text } in the same way you write the equivalent HTML prose.
To put in your own PDF bookmarks, use \pdfbookmark[n ]{title }{internal label }, with
internal label serving as a label for any \ref references you want to put in.
4.4.2 Web documents from LaTeX source
The latex2html program, available on the Web and on Athena in the infoagents locker, is a Perl
script that generates a set of HTML pages from a Latex document. It can make a single Web page,
or a set of them, with a page for each section, subsection or so on and so forth. To generate a Web
page set based in the directory dstdir, from a document file.tex, type latex2html -d dstdir
file.tex. This will generate a whole tree of HTML les for each subsection. The control how
deep the tree should go, there is the -split option. For a single HTML page, set it as -split 0.
For more information, type latex2html -help.
8
Do not confuse dvipdfm with the dvipdf program in the ghostscript locker, which actually runs dvips and
ps2pdf.
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4.5 Landscape (or Sideways) Mode
If you want to print your document sideways, with the text running parallel to the long edge of
the paper, simply include
\special{landscape}
in the preamble of your document. You also need to set the margins to correspond to this new
paper size (11x8.5

instead of 8.5x11

). See Section 6.1 for details on changing them, p. 13.

4.6 Using Both Sides of the Paper: Duplex and Tumble Modes
Two-sided printing has two modes. In duplex printing, the pages are printed such that the pages
read correctly when turned over the long axis (as in a book). In tumble mode (also known as short-
edge duplexing), pages read correctly when turned upwards (as in a legal notepad). The orientation
will obviously be somewhat dierent if the printout is landscape mode instead of portrait mode.
For most uses, the duplex mode is the more tting.
With dvips, you can print in duplex or tumble mode by using the -h option:
dvips -h duplex filename.dvi
or dvips -h tumble filename.dvi
If you always want your document to be printed two-sided, you can include one of the following
commands in your document preamble:
\special{header=duplex}
\special{header=tumble}
5 Error Messages
The error messages produced by L
A
T
E
X are the most confusing part of using it. Most people have
trouble understanding what L
A
T
E
X is telling them. This section describes some of the more common
errors, what they mean, and how you can x the problem.
In general, when an error occurs you should hit return to see if L
A
T
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X will keep on going, or
enter x to exit. If L
A
T
E
X is asking for a lename, Control-D will help exit L
A
T
E
X. If x, ^C, and ^D
do not return you to your athena% prompt, type ^Z. In order to kill the stopped process you need
to do the following (assuming that you use csh or one of its descendants):
athena% kill %latex
athena%
[1] + Terminated latex
athena%
By hitting return when you get your prompt back you should get the message that L
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X was
indeed killed.
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5.1 L
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X errors
There are two kinds of errors: L
A
T
E
X errors and T
E
X errors. T
E
X is the language in which L
A
T
E
X
is written, and some of the basic errors come from there. All errors have an error message which
starts with an exclamation point. A L
A
T
E
X error can be distinguished from a T
E
X error by the
following:
! LaTeX error: <error message here>
See the LaTeX manual or LaTeX Companion for explanation.
Type H <return> for immediate help.
...
The error message is printed on the next line, which starts with a number and then the text of the
line that caused the error. The part of the number after the decimal point is the line number where
the error occurred. If you cannot gure out what the problem is by looking at the error message,
you can go to the oending line in the original document and look at it. The problem may lie a
few lines above the one which L
A
T
E
X complained about. The error message should make more sense
after you have looked at the oending text.
Some of the more common error messages are:
! \begin{...} ended by \end{...}.
This is usually caused by forgetting to end an environment which was started by a \begin command.
! Can be used only in preamble.
Certain commands can only be entered before the \begin{document} statement. This part of the
le is called the preamble. Move the oending statement to the preamble and try again.
! Environment ... undefined.
An environment dened in a \begin or \end statement is not recognized. This is usually caused
by a spelling error.
! Missing \begin{document}.
All les must have a \begin{document} before any text which is intended to be printed.
5.2 T
E
X errors
! I cant find file ....
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This often indicates that the le name was mistyped or that you are not in the correct directory.
T
E
X will wait for you to type in a le name. If a mistake was made, and you want to abort the
command, you will need to hit ^D which will cause an Emergency stop when T
E
X is waiting for
you to type something.
! Missing { inserted.
! Missing } inserted.
! Missing $ inserted.
This usually occurs if a command was typed which can only be used in math mode. L
A
T
E
X can be
allowed to continue, but the output will look strange. The oending command should be put into
math mode by surrounding it with dollar signs, like: $\sum$
! Undefined control sequence.
l.7 \auhtor{The Student Information Processing Board}
The command \auhtor on line seven is misspelled and so L
A
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E
X does not recognize it. If L
A
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X
does not recognize a command you used, but you think it exists, check the documentation again
to make sure you are using the command correctly.
If you cannot gure out what is wrong, give the SIPB oce a call,
9
or try the Athena Consul-
tants.
10
The Zephyr help class is also often useful; see the document Inessential Zephyr for more
details on using zephyr classes and instances.
5.3 Warnings
Warnings do not cause L
A
T
E
X to stop processing the document, but preview the output before
printing your nal version to make sure the output is acceptable. Below are some common warnings,
followed by explanations. In general, T
E
X is probably more of a perfectionist about wanting to get
your spacing right than you are, so you shouldnt worry if it complains about overfull/underfull
when it looks ne to you.
Overfull \hbox (24.30751pt too wide) in paragraph at lines 6--9
This occurs whenever a line is too wide the available horizontal space (e.g. margins, or special
boxes). L
A
T
E
X will produce a line that is too wide when it cannot nd an acceptable place to insert
a line break. Use xdvi to look at the output, then change the le if necessary.
Underfull \hbox (badness 10000) in paragraph at lines 6--18
9
Our phone number is 253-7788, or stop by W20-557just outside the Student Center cluster.
10
On-line, type olc or call 253-4435.
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This error is similar to Overfull \hbox. It occurs when L
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X is forced to put lots of space between
words to justify the text. This usually happens when a paragraph is not properly ended before
certain kinds of environments (like forcing a carriage return with \\). Inserting a blank line or a
\par command after the oending paragraph should x it.
LaTeX Warning: Label(s) may have changed. Rerun to get cross-references right.
This occurs when page numbers change from one running of L
A
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X to another. Simply re-run
L
A
T
E
X to resolve the problem. Occasionally, L
A
T
E
X will have to be run twice in a row to clear up
the problem.
6 Other useful things to know about
L
A
T
E
X is very powerful. There are commands to do almost anything. This guide is an attempt to
explain many of the commonly used commands. Below you will nd information that should help
you produce papers with L
A
T
E
X.
6.1 Margins
L
A
T
E
X has very large default marginsalmost two inches wide on each side. Most people dont like
them.
11
Fortunately, L
A
T
E
Xs margins can be changed. An easy way to use more of the page is to
use the fullpage option to documentclass (see Section 3.2, p. 5).
To set uniform margins, use the geometry package: \usepackage[margin=1.5in]{geometry}
For nonuniform margins, these options are available:
\usepackage[top=.8in,bottom=.8in,left=1in,right=2.54cm]{geometry}
For full details, see texdoc geometry.
6.2 Type Styles
There are several dierent type styles available in L
A
T
E
X: bold (textbf), sans serif (textsf), slanted
(textsl), small caps (textsc), typewriter (texttt), italic (textit), and the default, roman (textrm).
In general, italics should be produced with \emph{} rather than \textit{}.
12
To use one of these type styles simply use the appropriate command as shown in the following
example.
The following lines: Are produced by:
This is bold type. \textbf{This is bold type.}
This is sans serif type. \textsf{This is sans serif type.}
This is italic type. \textit{This is italic type.}
11
. . . but people writing books or theses often need them.
12
This is because \emph{} is about logical structure, and \textit{} is about a visual property. In some contexts,
the visual properties associated with emphasis may change, and text formatted as \emph{} will change appropriately.
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This is slanted type. \textsl{This is slanted type.}
This is Small Caps type. \textsc{This is Small Caps type.}
This is typewriter type. \texttt{This is typewriter type.}
This is normal, roman, type. \textrm{This is normal, roman, type.}
You will notice that there is no underline style. This is intentional, since underlining is not
normally used in a typeset document. Titles (and other text normally underlined in hand-written
documents) are properly emphasized with the \emph command.
13
6.3 Type Sizes
The type size can be controlled as well. If you want to change the size as well as the style, you
must set the size rst, and then the style; to get a large bold type style, type {\large\bf text}.
The following sizes: Are produced by:
This is tiny type. {\tiny This is tiny type.}
This is scriptsize type. {\scriptsize This is scriptsize type.}
This is footnotesize type. {\footnotesize This is footnotesize type.}
This is small type. {\small This is small type.}
This is normalsize type. {\normalsize This is normalsize type.}
This is large type. {\large This is large type.}
This is Large type. {\Large This is Large type.}
This is LARGE type. {\LARGE This is LARGE type.}
This is huge type. {\huge This is huge type.}
This is Huge type. {\Huge This is Huge type.}
6.4 Footnotes
Footnotes are very easy in L
A
T
E
X. You simply place the footnote text where you want the reference
to appear and L
A
T
E
X takes care of everything else. This sentence and footnote
14
were created by
typing the following:
This sentence and footnote\footnote{See? Its a footnote.} were created
by typing the following.
Dont use footnotes for citations though. See Section 10 (p. 26) for details.
6.5 Tables
L
A
T
E
X has a simple method for generating all sorts of tables. You give it one command to tell it
how to set up the table and then give it the data. You specify how many columns the table is
13
If you really want to get underlining, L
A
T
E
X supports \underline{text to be underlined}, but that command is
fragile and doesnt break across lines. A better choice is \usepackage{ulem}, which denes \uline{text}, and
several others. For detailed documentation, see less kpsewhich ulem.sty.
14
See? Its a footnote.
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going to have, what to do to the data within each column as well as how to separate each column.
When you enter the data you give one row at a time. The character & comes after each data eld
and \\ marks the end of a row. Here are several examples of what is possible and how to create
them.
a b c
aa bb cccccc
aaa bbb ccc
\begin{tabular}{clr}
a& b& c\\ aa& bb& cccccc\\
aaa&
bbb& ccc\\
\end{tabular}
This is a table with three columns. In the rst column the data are centered, in the second they
are left justied and in the third they are right justied. This was done by entering {clr}. Changing
what is in these curly braces changes the number of columns and how each one is formatted. Notice
that the line breaks in the typed text make no dierence to L
A
T
E
X. Rows are separated by the \\
character and the columns within the rows are separated by the & character.
You can also have boxes around the table and lines separating the columns if you like. L
A
T
E
X
will put vertical lines wherever you put a | in the column specications. L
A
T
E
X has two commands
for creating horizontal lines in tables. \hline creates a horizontal line across the whole table.
\cline{m-n} creates a horizontal line from the beginning of column m to the end of column n.
a b c
aa bb cc
aaa bbb ccc
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{||c|l||r||}\hline
a& b& c\\ \cline{2-3} aa& bb& cc\\
\hline aaa&
bbb& ccc\\ \hline\hline
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
6.6 Lists
There are four dierent types of lists in L
A
T
E
X. The following is an example containing all four.
Enumerate will give you a numbered list.
1. You can nest lists in L
A
T
E
X
(a) You can even sub-nest lists
(b) and it changes how they are
counted
2. up to four levels deep
Itemize produces a list with bullets
Some people like bullets.
Others do not.
Description is what you use when you want
to describe a list of items. This list of
list environments is an example of a
description. Notice that it will make the
items you are describing appear in bold
faced type.
List If you do not like any of these possibilities
you can modify the list environment to
create your own. See the L
A
T
E
X manual for
more information.
The following text was used to create the previous example (the entire example is columnized
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with the multicol package; see texdoc multicol). We have broken it up to add comments and
explanations of some of the more obscure commands.
% The percent sign is the comment character in LaTeX. LaTeX ignores
% everything on a line following a % character.
\begin{description}
% Notice the brackets and braces; {} are very different from [] in LaTeX
\item [Enumerate] will give you a numbered list.
\begin{enumerate}
\item You can nest lists in \LaTeX{}
\begin{enumerate}
\item You can even sub-nest lists
\item and it changes how they are counted
\end{enumerate}
\item up to four levels deep
\end{enumerate}
\item [Itemize] produces a list with bullets
\begin{itemize}
\item Some people like bullets,
\item while others do not.
\end{itemize}
\item [Description] is what you use when you want to describe a
list of items. This list of \verb+list+ environments is an example of
a \verb+description+.
\item [List] If you do not like any of these possibilities you can
modify the \verb+list+ environment to create your own. See the
\LaTeX{} manual for more information.
\end{description}
7 Documents in Foreign Languages
L
A
T
E
X is very useful for writing documents in foreign languages. L
A
T
E
X can theoretically support
any language. However, in reality, there is hyphenation support for only a few dozen. The standard
version of L
A
T
E
X supports the English language, and it can hyphenate most English words correctly.
The English version can be used to produce foreign language documents, but be warned that
hyphenation will be according to rules of the English language.
International characters Many Western languages use symbols and accents that do not appear
in normal English. L
A
T
E
X provides a convenient method of generating accents and other symbols.
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Figure 1 shows accents that can be placed on any existing charactersimply replace the o in the
curly braces with the letter you wish to accent.
o \{o} `o \{o} o \^{o} o \"{o} o \~{o} o \={o} o \.{o}
o \u{o} o \v{o} o \H{o} oo \t{oo} o \c{o} o
.
\d{o} o

\b{o}
Figure 1: Accents
Some other foreign characters are encoded directly, when they cannot be built as combinations.
Figure 2 shows foreign-language symbols which are available, and Figure 3 shows some special non-
English symbols. Note that these characters cannot immediately be followed by other characters,
so you must follow them with a space or with empty curly braces, as in:
Lukasiewicz invented prex (Polish) notation.
which is produced by
\L{}ukasiewicz invented prefix (Polish) notation.
\oe \OE \ae \AE a \aa

A \AA \o \O l \l L \L
\ss ? !
Figure 2: Foreign language symbols
\dag \ddag \S \P c _ \copyright \pounds
Figure 3: Special Language Symbols
8 Mathematical Text and other Special Symbols
Equations can be inserted into your text in several ways. Placing $. . . $ or \(. . . \) or \begin{math}
. . . \end{math} around the mathematical expression or special symbol allows you to place it in a
line of normal text. This will use the variable-sized symbols (see Table 7, p. 21; and Figure 6, p.
19), and adjust the size of the formula as necessary. It will also adjust other things. For example,
to place

n
i=1
in a line of text, L
A
T
E
X puts the i = 1 to the right of the

instead of underneath.
Placing \[. . . \] or \begin{displaymath}. . . \end{displaymath} around the expression will center
it and set it o from the rest of the text, using the larger symbols.
To create a simple equation, for example F = ma, you need only type $ F=ma $. For more
advanced formul, like E = mc
2
, you need to tell L
A
T
E
X to superscript the 2. The ^ character
instructs L
A
T
E
X to raise a superscript, and the _ character instructs L
A
T
E
X to lower a subscript.
For example, $ E=mc^2 $ is used to produce E = mc
2
. Likewise $ x_{k+1} $ is used to
produce x
k+1
.
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If you want to put more than one character in the superscript or subscript, you need to
group them, using { and } as in the examples above. To print something with both super-
scripts and subscripts, like
238
U
+4
, just type $ _{238}U^{+4} $. Anything can go into the brack-
ets, and L
A
T
E
X will gure out what to do with it: x
35+9
yz
+4z
1997
requires the hideous expression
$x^{35+9^{y_{z}}+4_{z}}_{1997}$, but if you look carefully it should be clear what is happen-
ing. To get the prime (

) symbol in math mode, type an apostrophe (). Try some complex

expressions of your own, and see how easy they are to create. There are many symbols not found
on the keyboard to help you in formatting just about any kind of formula. See Tables 2, 3, 5 and
6 (pp. 20-21) for symbols not found on the keyboard, like , , and .
Of course, not all expressions are polynomials. L
A
T
E
X uses two special cases, \sqrt and \frac
to create square roots (radical sign surrounding the entire expression) and fractions (one expression
over another with a dividing bar between them) respectively. The term
_
1
v
2
c
2
, commonly used in
Lorentz transformations, is expressed as $\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}} $ in line. You might want
it displayed as
_
1
v
2
c
2
instead, which is generated with \[\sqrt{1-\frac{v^2}{c^2}} \].
If the equation is more interesting, or if you want to refer to it later on, you might want to
assign it a number by using the equation environment. The quadratic formula
x =
b

b
2
4ac
2a
(1)
is displayed by
\begin{equation}
x=\frac{-b\pm\sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}
\end{equation}
You can supply an optional argument to \sqrt, specifying a dierent root than 2. For example,
the fourth root,
4

1024, is expressed as \sqrt[4]{1024}.

Often in a mathematical equation you will want to use symbols instead of the standard italicized
letters for variable names. You can add Greek letters by typing the command associated with the
particular lettersee Table 1 on page 19.
Note that if you want to use Greek letters in normal text mode, you must place them in a
math environment by surrounding them with $. . . $. You can also create function names with the
CALLIGRAPHY font. This is treated like any type style change, such as \bf, but like the Greek
letters, you can use it only in math mode, and you only have the 26 upper-case letters available
(see Table 29, p. 25).
Sometimes, a formula contains text that should be set in roman type. For example, in the
formula log xy = log x+log y, the word log is not italicized like the variables x and y. It would
be inconvenient to have to exit math mode to type the text in normal roman type, so the most
common function names are dened as special commands. If the desired command isnt dened,
you can use something like $x = \textrm{foo}$ to produce x = foo rather than x = foo. A
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formula such as cos
2
x+sin
2
x = 1 would be entered as $\cos^2 x + \sin^2 x = 1$. See Table 8
(p. 21) for a list of all the special commands which are typeset like this.
The modulus function is slightly dierent from the other special commandsit has two forms,
a binary and a parenthesized one. See Figure 4 for an example of their usage. There are also
various types of brackets and other delimiters available in math mode, as shown in Table 9 (p. 21).
Certain accents and other diacritical marks are available in math mode. Some of these math mode
accents are only available in math mode, while others are modied to work better in math mode.
See Table 11 (p. 21) for examples.
a mod b a \bmod b
(mod a + b) \pmod{a+b}
Figure 4: Modulus functions
The symbols in Figure 5 were provided by L
A
T
E
X 2.09, but not by L
A
T
E
X2

. You can access

them by using the latexsym package.
0 \mho 1 \Join 2 \Box 3 \Diamond ; \leadsto
< \sqsubset = \sqsupset \lhd \unlhd \rhd
\unrhd
Figure 5: Symbols available in the latexsym package
All of the tables on the succeeding pages are available online as texdoc symbols. Those whose
captions refer to AMS require \usepackage{amsmath}.
\alpha \theta o o \tau
\beta \vartheta \pi \upsilon
\gamma \iota \varpi \phi
\delta \kappa \rho \varphi
\epsilon \lambda \varrho \chi
\varepsilon \mu \sigma \psi
\zeta \nu \varsigma \omega
\eta \xi
\Gamma \Lambda \Sigma \Psi
\Delta \Xi \Upsilon \Omega
\Theta \Pi \Phi
Table 1: Greek Letters
__
__
\iint
___
___
\iiint
_

_
_

_
\idotsint
Figure 6: Variable-sized symbols only in amsmath
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\pm \cap \diamond \oplus
\mp \cup

\bigtriangleup \ominus
\times \uplus

\bigtriangledown \otimes
\div \sqcap \triangleleft \oslash
\ast \sqcup \triangleright \odot
\star \vee \lhd

_ \bigcirc
\circ \wedge \rhd

\dagger
\bullet \setminus \unlhd

\ddagger
\cdot \wr \unrhd

\amalg
+ + -

Not predened in L
A
T
E
X2

. Use one of the packages latexsym, amsfonts or amssymb.

Table 2: Binary Operation Symbols
\leq \geq \equiv [= \models
\prec \succ \sim \perp
_ \preceq _ \succeq \simeq [ \mid
\ll \gg \asymp | \parallel
\subset \supset \approx \bowtie
\subseteq \supseteq

= \cong 1 \Join

< \sqsubset

= \sqsupset

,= \neq \smile
\sqsubseteq \sqsupseteq
.
= \doteq \frown
\in \ni \propto = =
\vdash \dashv < < > >
: :

Not predened in L
A
T
E
X2

. Use one of the packages latexsym, amsfonts or amssymb.

Table 3: Relation Symbols
, , ; ; : \colon . \ldotp \cdotp
Table 4: Punctuation Symbols
\leftarrow \longleftarrow \uparrow
\Leftarrow = \Longleftarrow \Uparrow
\rightarrow \longrightarrow \downarrow
\Rightarrow = \Longrightarrow \Downarrow
\leftrightarrow \longleftrightarrow \updownarrow
\Leftrightarrow \Longleftrightarrow \Updownarrow
\mapsto \longmapsto \nearrow
\hookleftarrow \hookrightarrow \searrow
\leftharpoonup \rightharpoonup \swarrow
\leftharpoondown \rightharpoondown \nwarrow
\rightleftharpoons ; \leadsto

Not predened in L
A
T
E
X2

. Use one of the packages latexsym, amsfonts or amssymb.

Table 5: Arrow Symbols
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. . . \ldots \cdots
.
.
. \vdots
.
.
. \ddots
\aleph \prime \forall \infty
/ \hbar \emptyset \exists 2 \Box

\imath \nabla \neg 3 \Diamond

\jmath

\surd \flat \triangle

\ell \top \natural \clubsuit
\wp \bot \sharp \diamondsuit
\Re | \| \backslash \heartsuit
\Im \angle \partial \spadesuit
0 \mho

. . [ |

Not predened in L
A
T
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X2

. Use one of the packages latexsym, amsfonts or amssymb.

Table 6: Miscellaneous Symbols

\sum

\bigcap

\bigodot

\prod

\bigcup

\bigotimes

\coprod

\bigsqcup

\bigoplus
_
\int
_
\bigvee

\biguplus
_
\oint
_
\bigwedge
Table 7: Variable-sized Symbols
\arccos \cos \csc \exp \ker \limsup \min \sinh
\arcsin \cosh \deg \gcd \lg \ln \Pr \sup
\arctan \cot \det \hom \lim \log \sec \tan
\arg \coth \dim \inf \liminf \max \sin \tanh
Table 8: Log-like Symbols
( ( ) ) \uparrow \Uparrow
[ [ ] ] \downarrow \Downarrow
\{ \} \updownarrow \Updownarrow
\lfloor \rfloor \lceil \rceil
\langle ) \rangle / / \backslash
[ | | \|
Table 9: Delimiters
_
_
\rmoustache
_
_
\lmoustache
_
_
\rgroup
_
_
\lgroup

\arrowvert
_
_
\Arrowvert

\bracevert
Table 10: Large Delimiters
a \hat{a} a \acute{a} a \bar{a} a \dot{a} a \breve{a}
a \check{a} ` a \grave{a} a \vec{a} a \ddot{a} a \tilde{a}
Table 11: Math mode accents
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abc \widetilde{abc}

abc \widehat{abc}

abc \overleftarrow{abc}

abc \overrightarrow{abc}
abc \overline{abc} abc \underline{abc}
..
abc \overbrace{abc} abc
..
\underbrace{abc}

abc \sqrt{abc}
n

abc \sqrt[n]{abc}
f

f
abc
xyz
\frac{abc}{xyz}
Table 12: Some other constructions
' \ulcorner \urcorner , \llcorner \lrcorner
Table 13: AMS Delimiters
--- \dashrightarrow --- \dashleftarrow \leftleftarrows \leftrightarrows
\Lleftarrow \twoheadleftarrow \leftarrowtail \looparrowleft
\leftrightharpoons . \curvearrowleft \circlearrowleft \Lsh
\upuparrows \upharpoonleft \downharpoonleft \multimap
- \leftrightsquigarrow \rightrightarrows \rightleftarrows \rightrightarrows
\rightleftarrows \twoheadrightarrow \rightarrowtail + \looparrowright
\rightleftharpoons \curvearrowright \circlearrowright \Rsh
_ \downdownarrows \upharpoonright \downharpoonright ~ \rightsquigarrow
Table 14: AMS Arrows
\nleftarrow \nrightarrow = \nLeftarrow = \nRightarrow
\nleftrightarrow = \nLeftrightarrow
Table 15: AMS Negated Arrows
\digamma \varkappa
Table 16: AMS Greek
Q \beth \daleth \gimel
Table 17: AMS Hebrew
/ \hbar \hslash \vartriangle \triangledown
\square \lozenge \circledS \angle
\measuredangle \nexists 0 \mho \Finv
, \Game k \Bbbk \ \backprime \varnothing
# \blacktriangle * \blacktriangledown B \blacksquare # \blacklozenge
\bigstar \sphericalangle \complement \eth
, \diagup \diagdown
Table 18: AMS Miscellaneous
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\dotplus \smallsetminus \Cap \Cup
\barwedge \veebar , \doublebarwedge \boxminus
\boxtimes \boxdot \boxplus \divideontimes
\ltimes \rtimes \leftthreetimes \rightthreetimes
\curlywedge \curlyvee \circleddash \circledast
\circledcirc . \centerdot \intercal
Table 19: AMS Binary Operators
\leqq \leqslant \eqslantless _ \lesssim
_ \lessapprox \approxeq \lessdot \lll
\lessgtr \lesseqgtr _ \lesseqqgtr = \doteqdot
= \risingdotseq = \fallingdotseq \backsim \backsimeq
\subseteqq \Subset < \sqsubset - \preccurlyeq
- \curlyeqprec _ \precsim _ \precapprox \vartriangleleft
_ \trianglelefteq = \vDash ' \Vvdash \smallsmile
\smallfrown \bumpeq \Bumpeq \geqq
\geqslant \eqslantgtr _ \gtrsim _ \gtrapprox
\gtrdot \ggg \gtrless \gtreqless
_ \gtreqqless \eqcirc \circeq = \triangleq
\thicksim \thickapprox \supseteqq \Supset
= \sqsupset , \succcurlyeq ` \curlyeqsucc _ \succsim
_ \succapprox \vartriangleright _ \trianglerighteq ' \Vdash
. \shortmid + \shortparallel \between \pitchfork
\varpropto \blacktriangleleft \therefore ~ \backepsilon
\blacktriangleright \because
Table 20: AMS Binary Relations
\nless _ \nleq \nleqslant _ \nleqq
_ \lneq _ \lneqq _ \lvertneqq _ \lnsim
\lnapprox \nprec _ \npreceq _ \precnsim
_ \precnapprox \nsim \nshortmid \nmid
- \nvdash = \nvDash \ntriangleleft _ \ntrianglelefteq
_ \nsubseteq _ \subsetneq _ \varsubsetneq _ \subsetneqq
\varsubsetneqq \ngtr _ \ngeq \ngeqslant
_ \ngeqq _ \gneq _ \gneqq _ \gvertneqq
_ \gnsim \gnapprox \nsucc _ \nsucceq
_ \nsucceq _ \succnsim _ \succnapprox \ncong
+ \nshortparallel \nparallel = \nvDash \nVDash
\ntriangleright _ \ntrianglerighteq _ \nsupseteq \nsupseteqq
_ \supsetneq _ \varsupsetneq _ \supsetneqq \varsupsetneqq
Table 21: AMS Negated Binary Relations
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[ \Lbag \Rbag \lbag \rbag
[ \llceil ] \rrceil [ \llfloor _ \rrfloor
\llbracket [ \rrbracket
Table 22: stmaryrd Delimiters
= \Longmapsfrom .= \Longmapsto \Mapsfrom . \Mapsto
, \nnearrow \ \nnwarrow _ \ssearrow \sswarrow
) \shortdownarrow + \shortuparrow \shortleftarrow \shortrightarrow
\longmapsfrom \mapsfrom + \leftarrowtriangle \rightarrowtriangle
\lightning ) \rrparenthesis = \leftrightarroweq + \leftrightarrowtriangle
Table 23: stmaryrd Arrows
\Arrownot \Mapsfromchar . \Mapstochar
\arrownot \mapsfromchar
Table 24: stmaryrd Extension Characters
\Ydown - \Yleft \Yright \Yup
| \baro \bbslash \binampersand \bindnasrepma
\boxast \boxbar \boxbox \boxbslash
\boxcircle \boxdot \boxempty \boxslash
\curlyveedownarrow \curlyveeuparrow \curlywedgedownarrow ) \curlywedgeuparrow
\fatbslash , \fatsemi \fatslash \interleave
< \leftslice ^ \merge \minuso \moo
+ \nplus \obar \oblong \obslash
\ogreaterthan \olessthan \ovee \owedge
. \rightslice \sslash \talloblong \varbigcirc
\varcurlyvee ) \varcurlywedge j \varoast j \varobar
\varobslash , \varocircle \varodot , \varogreaterthan
\varolessthan \varominus \varoplus , \varoslash
; \varotimes Q \varovee , \varowedge ` \vartimes
Table 25: stmaryrd Binary Operators

\bigbox
_
\bigcurlyvee
_
\bigcurlywedge

\biginterleave

\bignplus
_
\bigparallel

\bigsqcap

\bigtriangledown

\bigtriangleup
Table 26: stmaryrd Large Binary Operators
+ \inplus + \niplus \subsetplus _ \subsetpluseq
\supsetplus _ \supsetpluseq \trianglelefteqslant _ \trianglerighteqslant
Table 27: stmaryrd Binary Relations
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\ntrianglelefteqslant \ntrianglerighteqslant
Table 28: stmaryrd Negated Binary Relations
Required package
ABCdef \mathrm{ABCdef}
ABCdef \mathit{ABCdef}
ABCdef \mathnormal{ABCdef}
/B( \mathcal{ABC}
ABC \mathcal{ABC} euscript with option: mathcal
\mathscr{ABC} euscript with option: mathcr
ABCdef \mathfrak{ABCdef} eufrak
ABC \mathbb{ABC} amsfonts or amssymb
Table 29: Math Alphabets
9 Pretty Pictures
9.1 Including PostScript and PDF Files
To import picture les into L
A
T
E
X, you need to generate les in the Encapsulated PostScript format.
Many programs, e.g. Matlab will create EPS les for you. Otherwise, the utility ps2epsi will
convert any PS le into an EPS one for you (just type ps2ps filename.ps filename.eps).
Having done so, you have many packages at your disposal to import the le into your L
A
T
E
X
document. We recommend the graphicx package. An example of how it is used is below:
\usepackage{graphicx}
... ... ...
\begin{figure}
\label{ndas}
\includegraphics[scale=0.5]{ndas}
\caption{Nude, descending a staircase.}
\end{figure}
The scale directive is an example of one of the many things the includegraphics directive
lets you do. The trim argument lets you make a picture of only a cropped portion of the imported
le, and the angle and origin arguments let that cropped portion be rotated. For the full details,
see texdoc grfguide.
When latex looks at this section, it will go and nd the le ndas.eps and put it in the image.
For documents created with pdflatex, you can include other PDF les as gures, as well as .png,
.gif, and .jpeg images. Conveniently enough, the above piece of L
A
T
E
X code will prompt pdflatex
to nd the le ndas.pdf for making the image. You can use the epstopdf utility to convert PS to
PDF. Matlab can also export PDF.
MIT SIPB 25 Revision 4.26
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9.2 L
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X picture Environment
You can create pictures within L
A
T
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X using a limited set of picture symbols. These include vector,
line, oval, and others. They are fairly dicult to use, and you have to set them up by hand.
Fortunately, the xfig drawing utility (add graphics) and the dia diagram program (add dia) let
you create such gures with your mouse and generate the L
A
T
E
X code that will create them. Just
use the export button and copy the resulting le into your L
A
T
E
X document. For more information
you should refer to the L
A
T
E
X manual, and also SIPBs Inessential Graphics on Athena.
This picture was made with the following L
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X
code.
\begin{picture}(80,80)(0,0)
\put(60,77){\vector(1,0){7}}
\put(60,85){$\theta^+$}
\put(60,40){\line(1,5){10}}
\put(60,40){\line(0,1){50}}
\put(60,40){\oval(40,40)[l]}
\put(60,20){\line(0,1){40}}
\put(0,40){\vector(1,0){40}}
\put(0,43){flow}
\end{picture}
-

'
&
-
ow
Another way to get pictures in your L
A
T
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X document is to use plain T
E
X commands. See The
TeXbook and/or ask for more information.
10 Citations and References
Your document may require references from one section to another, references to gures, tables, or
references to other documents in a bibliography. Once you begin to edit and re-edit your document,
L
A
T
E
X can keep track of those references better than you can yourself. For internal references, you
start by using \label{foo22} anywhere you will later want to put a reference. In the source
code for this guide, this section is marked \label{sec:cite}. The label must be unique. The
conventional label for a section is the mark sec, then the semicolon, then a relevant keyword.
Once the section is labeled, you can put Section~\ref{sec:cite} (p. \pageref{sec:cite})
anywhere and it will always refer to Section 10 (p. 26) no matter how things get rearranged.
To build a bibliography of external references, some people use the BibT
E
X tool, but it is
overkill for most users
15
. Instead, use the thebibliography environment (the parameter in curly
braces after \begin{thebibliography} should be the widest label you use, so L
A
T
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X can size the
indentation appropriately.):
Practitioners of quantum gravity should read \cite{sokalhoax}.
.
.
.
\begin{thebibliography}{Sokal 96}
\bibitem[Sokal 96]{sokalhoax} Sokal, Alan. Transgressing the
15
See texdoc btxdoc and man bibtex for details; BibT
E
X is most useful when citing the same references in multiple
documents.
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Boundaries, towards a formative hermeneutics of quantum gravity.
\emph{Lingua Franca}: 1996.
\bibitem{1066} Sellar, W.C. \& R.J. Yeatman. \emph{1066 and
all that: a memorable history of England}. 1953. New York: E.P. Dutton.
\end{thebibliography}
Which then appears as:
Practitioners of quantum gravity should read [Sokal 96].
.
.
.
[Sokal 96] Sokal, Alan. Transgressing the Boundaries, towards a formative hermeneu-
tics of quantum gravity. Lingua Franca: 1996.
[1] Sellar, W.C. & R.J. Yeatman. 1066 and all that: a memorable history of
England. 1953. New York: E.P. Dutton.
If the optional [Sokol 96] label is omitted, then L
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Xwill number your \bibitem entries for
you.
11 Setting Page Layout Parameters
L
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X uses many parameters to layout a page. These parameters set the distance between the main
text and margin notes, headers, and footers, among other things. To change the value of one of
these parameters, you can use the \addtolength commands described in subsection 6.1 (p. 13).
Figure 7 shows the layout for a printed page reduced to 65% of full size.
12 Where to Get More Information
For a detailed overview and links to common packages, try: texdoc index.html
For quick lookups of L
A
T
E
X packages, use the texdoc command: texdoc packagename
L
A
T
E
X: A Document Preparation System: Users Guide & Reference Manual (Lamport) is a
very useful book which goes into much more detail than we have attempted here, for those who wish
to delve deeper into the intricacies of L
A
T
E
X. It is highly recommended, and not very expensive, at
least as far as reference books go ($30). A Guide to L
A
T
E
X: Document Preparation for Beginners
and Advanced Users (Kopka and Daly) is also quite useful, and substantially more detailed.
Since Athena ocially supports L
A
T
E
X, you can ask questions about it using olc ask latex,
and look through the OLC Stock Answers for the answers to other commonly asked questions (olc
answers or on the Web at http://web.mit.edu/answers/).
You may also wish to look at the online version of the L
A
T
E
X users guide, which is particularly
useful when converting documents to L
A
T
E
X2

format: texdoc usrguide. The Not So Short

Introduction to L
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T
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X2

is also recommended: texdoc lshort.

If youre looking for special symbols, the ones in this document are also available by typ-
ing texdoc symbols. The Comprehensive L
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E
X Symbol List, a 98-page wonder, is also avail-
MIT SIPB 27 Revision 4.26
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-
1in
6
?
1in
A line of text. . .
Next line of text. . . 6
?
\baselinestretch\baselineskip
-
\oddsidemargin
-
\evensidemargin
Page Text
Page Footer 6
?
\footheight
6
?
\footskip
-
\textwidth
6
?
\textheight
6
?
\headheight
6
?
\headsep
6
?
\topmargin
Page Header
Margin
note A
6
?
\marginparpush
Margin
note B
-
\marginparwidth
-
\marginparsep
Figure 7: Page layout parameters.
Revision 4.26 28 MIT SIPB
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able. SIPBs oce has a bound copy, and you can view it online (PDF or PS) by running
texdoc symbols.html and clicking on the folder icon.
You can come by the SIPB oce (in W20-557, just outside the Student Center cluster), or call
us on the phone (617-253-7788), particularly if you have a more obscure or complicated question.
As a last resort, The T
E
Xbook describes the T
E
X typesetting system, which forms the basis for
L
A
T
E
X. It is signicantly harder to understand than the L
A
T
E
X manual.
CTAN, the Comprehensive TeX Archive Network, centered at http://www.ctan.org, is another
good resource for L
A
T
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X information, and for such things as the L
A
T
E
X templates required by various
publishers and academic organizations.
13 Converting from L
A
T
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X 2.09 to L
A
T
E
X2

Converting documents from L

A
T
E
X 2.09 format to L
A
T
E
X2

format is fairly simple. The primary

dierences are that \documentstyle has been replaced with \documentclass, and that outside
packages are included \usepackage.
Another change is that the commands such as {\tt} have been superseded by the commands
of the form \texttt{}. L
A
T
E
X2

also added the \textsuperscript command for use in normal

text as an alternative to using math mode to generate superscripted text. See Section 12, above,
for several additional sources of information which are useful in converting documents.
Running Previous Versions of L
A
T
E
X The supported version of L
A
T
E
X on Athena is currently
L
A
T
E
X2

, but there are usually separate installations of older versions available. Currently, L
A
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X
2.09 is available in the newtex locker. You can access it by typing:
add newtex
latex209 filename.tex
MIT SIPB 29 Revision 4.26
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14 Acknowledgments
The original version of this document was written
by Mark Eichin to give people a handy reference to
the many symbols that L
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T
E
X supports, especially
the math mode symbols. Most of his text and all
of his tables were included in the guide that you
are holding now.
The rest of the rst edition of the guide
was written and edited by Nancy Gilman, David
Jedlinsky and Mary Vogt, with lots of comments
(amage) from SIPB members and other people
who experimented with the early versions of the
guide. Robert French perfected this document to
produce Revision 1.
Later, Chee Chew, added more changes (with
more input/amage from SIPB members) to pro-
duce Revision 2.
Revision 3 was updated by Mark Eichin to
cover the replacement of dvi2ps by the superior
dvips, to acknowledge Athenas support of L
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T
E
X,
and to include further SIPB member comments.
Subsequent changes have been made by Richard
Barbalace, bert Dvornik, and Chad Brown, with
the cheerful support of many SIPB members and
prospectives.
Revision 4 was updated by Alex Rolfe to re-
ect the adoption of L
A
T
E
X2

as the default version

on Athena. John Hawkinson made numerous edits
and is the current document maintainer.
Thanks to John Kohl and Jean Marie Diaz for
getting most of the original T
E
X and L
A
T
E
X system
running on Athena in the rst place; without their
eorts, this guide would be useless.
And, of course, thanks to Don Knuth, the au-
thor of T
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X, and Leslie Lamport, the author of
L
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T
E
X; they have done an incredible job.
15 List of Figures
1 Accents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2 Foreign language symbols . . . . . . . 17
3 Special Language Symbols . . . . . . . 17
4 Modulus functions . . . . . . . . . . . 19
5 latexsym Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . 19
6 Variable-sized symbols only in amsmath 19
7 Page layout parameters. . . . . . . . . 28
16 List of Tables
1 Greek Letters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2 Binary Operation Symbols . . . . . . . 20
3 Relation Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
4 Punctuation Symbols . . . . . . . . . . 20
5 Arrow Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
6 Miscellaneous Symbols . . . . . . . . . 21
7 Variable-sized Symbols . . . . . . . . . 21
8 Log-like Symbols . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
9 Delimiters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
10 Large Delimiters . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
11 Math mode accents . . . . . . . . . . . 21
12 Some other constructions . . . . . . . 22
13 AMS Delimiters . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
14 AMS Arrows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
15 AMS Negated Arrows . . . . . . . . . 22
16 AMS Greek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
17 AMS Hebrew . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
18 AMS Miscellaneous . . . . . . . . . . . 22
19 AMS Binary Operators . . . . . . . . 23
20 AMS Binary Relations . . . . . . . . . 23
21 AMS Negated Binary Relations . . . . 23
22 stmaryrd Delimiters . . . . . . . . . . . 24
23 stmaryrd Arrows . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
24 stmaryrd Extension Characters . . . . 24
25 stmaryrd Binary Operators . . . . . . . 24
26 stmaryrd Large Binary Operators . . . 24
27 stmaryrd Binary Relations . . . . . . . 24
28 stmaryrd Negated Binary Relations . . 25
29 Math Alphabets . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Revision 4.26 30 MIT SIPB